Chronic Pain Today

Chronic pain sufferers face many challenges in their lives. The inability to know what their energy and pain level will be from day to day is a frustrating part of their life that never goes away. However, there are ways that you can better manage your pain and cope with your condition. These ways will help you have more good days than bad, and keep you releasing your own natural pain killers.

Accept Your Pain
This does not mean “Just deal with it”, far from it. I’m saying that you need to own your pain. Accept that you have it, don’t deny it isn’t there. Also, don’t exaggerate the intensity or level of your pain either. Just take it for what it is, and how it changes, and move past it.

Stay Healthy and Active
Move around, don’t just sit and refuse to move because it hurts when you do. It will hurt more after you become sedentary and try to do the little things again. Make sure that your lifestyle is healthy, no smoking, no drinking, eat the right foods, and make sure that you eat and sleep on a regular basis. Late nights, greasy foods, and a cigarette here and there will harm your body, its responses, and therefore cause more pain for you later on. Aerobic exercise, walking is a fine example, will stimulate your natural painkillers called endorphins. Only 30 minutes a day for five to six days will increase your stamina, your endurance, make you healthier, and release these endorphins.

Relax and Chill Out
Sounds easy, but it’s the hardest step in this process. Learn some breathing exercises, get massages, try some positive visualization. Whatever can make your life a bit less anxious, depressing, or stressful is a positive step in your healing. Muscle tension that occurs in stress will increase your pain, both in length and intensity. Take a personal time out and hurt less.

Keep a Pain Diary
A pain diary can chart your pain and see where there are personal pain triggers. You will be able to see the actual range of your pain, when it’s most likely to occur, what days are better than others. Besides that, you will see if it’s dependent on foods, seasons, or certain activities. A pain diary is a great way to track your days for better tomorrows. Always take it to your doctor visits to help in your total recovery.

Welcome to Today.com. This brand new blog, Chronic Pain, is designed to help educate about chronic pain and offer support for those living with chronic pain.

 I have been living with a chronic pain condition since 1993. My name is Tina and I have Interstitial Cystitis. Interstitial Cystitis is a condition in which the bladder lining is damaged, there is no cure, and those with the disease are classified as chronic pain sufferers.  I’m here to help in any way that I can, and I hope that I can shine a light on some of the conditions, the treatments, and the day to day living we go through. This blog will not be all about IC (Interstitial Cystitis), it will include ALL chronic pain conditions, so if a particular post doesn’t help you I hope that the next day’s post will. Please feel free to always comment so that I can learn what my readers would like to know more about.

Please feel free to leave me any comments on topics that you would like to see in upcoming blogs, or to share any thoughts you have on life with chronic pain.